Them: What's Djibouti?
Me: It's Djibouti.
I may have been a bit facetious but it is really tough to explain. It's starts off describing Somali pirates, pivots to becoming an Al Qaeda terrorist plot, then into a classic Leonard Elmore crime novel. All this with documentary filmmakers Dara and Xavier as the heroes. Lots of good Leonard type dialog and characters.
I enjoyed the book. It was good brain candy when I needed a break from dry history and science. I recommend it.
I remember after we were there a couple of days someone asked the XO what was there to do in Djibouti and he said it basically came down to, "you could watch the cats die in the street." OTOH, I watched some cute girls play volleyball at the embassy, quaffed some beers on an almost nice porch bar downtown and in a suicidal moment agreed to play halfback in a soccer contest with the FFL. Never ever doing that again!
ReplyDeleteHard to believe that good fiction comes out of the place.
Thanks for the rec… and the Boise library has it. Lookin’ forward to the read.
ReplyDeleteSP RN
A friend already asked me for the book. Glad to be passing it on. Big fan of Elmore Leonard.
ReplyDeleteNever heard of Djibouti before but it turns out to be a pretty big naval hotspot.